


In a Strange Land

by YaeL (thesometimeswarrior)



Series: Rabbis. In. SPACE! [1]
Category: Zionist Galactic Federation (Tumblr), תלמוד | Talmud
Genre: (kind of), Alternate Universe - Space, Angst, Character Study, Collection: Purimgifts Day 1, Ficlet, Gen, Judaism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:55:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22618990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesometimeswarrior/pseuds/YaeL
Summary: The fact is, the Jews know about longing.They know about longing because they’velonged. For three thousand years, they’ve longed—first for Jerusalem, and then, eventually, for Earth.
Series: Rabbis. In. SPACE! [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1630225
Comments: 8
Kudos: 16
Collections: Purimgifts 2020





	In a Strange Land

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Treon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Treon/gifts).



> I know that the original Zionist Galactic Federation had all the Jews on the moon, and that this isn't the case here, but it nonetheless felt in the spirit of the project! I hope that's okay!
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

The fact is, the Jews know about longing.

They know about longing because they’ve _longed_. For three thousand years, they’ve longed—first for Jerusalem, and then, eventually, for Earth. 

Those actions are, Yohanan thinks, more similar than one might expect. They turn toward the Sol System—so many lightyears away, now—when they _daven_ , rather than explicitly toward Jerusalem. But, then, this action is, after all, itself turning toward Jerusalem…

(Concepts of space get fuzzy out here, though. They make a best guess as to where Earth is, floating out there—cold and dead, perhaps, but still _beautiful_ , still shining and cosmic, still reflecting that ethereal light somewhere into Space because it _has_ to be—but they can’t know for sure. So they pick a side of their space station, stare out the window, and declare it’s where they came from, and they hope they’re right, they _hope_ , and they pray…three times a day…)

(What is a day, when they don’t have the sun, charting its rise and fall across the sky like a map, like a tether?)

(What is time at all, without the moon to wax and wane, and spell out the parameters of their months, and therefore all their sacred festivals, and therefore the years themselves…?)

They’re disoriented, stumbling blindly, tripping over the metaphorical blocks in their path…

Yohanan has never felt more kinship with his ancestors—that generation that left Jerusalem when it was in flames for that long, long exile—than he does now. He doubts _anyone_ else in the history of their people has understood their plight as fully or as keenly as he does, now. The ground beneath his feet is literally _gone_ —just as it had been for his namesake, that ancient Rabbi Yohanan—and they’re all at risk of going in the same direction, if he doesn’t find some way to keep them all together. Space is cold, and vast, and unforgiving, and no one can face it alone…he has to keep them _together_. Their survival, their very _existence_ , depends on it…

So he trembles. And he grieves. He leads them _all_ in grieving, and together they _long_ , and that very fact has itself become a beacon of a sort. If they feel it, they know who they are, and _that_ , at least, is something…

(If there’s one thing the Jews have learned to trust across the millennia, it’s their own pain…)

So three times every twenty-four hours, they lean into it, face it like they face what they assume the general direction of Earth is, yearn out loud. 

They pray. They still pray.

( _Hear, O Israel…_ )

**Author's Note:**

> (Image of Jerusalem at night, from space.)


End file.
